There is little doubt that the brewing of freshly roasted coffee is superior to the brewing of coffee from beans which have been roasted well in advance of the consumption of the coffee product. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,196,342 notes that for coffee to have all its flavor, it should be consumed less than eight to ten days after it has been roasted. There is a further recognition that when coffee is roasted in a commercial shop, it is often roasted well in advance of its sale date resulting in the consumption of a less than ideal product.
Although coffee roasting is obviously conducted commercially, there has been limited success enjoyed by those wishing to roast coffee beans in small batches, for example, in homes or in coffee shops. The lack of universal success of small batch roasting stems primarily from the failure of the prior art to recognize the criticality that seemingly minor variations in the roasting process has in affecting the discernable characteristics of the final coffee product.
Virtually all small batch roasting devices have proven unsatisfactory because, in an effort to create a simple non-complex device, little or no attention has been given to the control of the coffee roasting process. Most small batch roasters simply provide for the capture of green beans and for the roasting of the beans at a predetermined temperature for a predetermined period of time whereupon the roasting process would end. Simplistic devices of this nature fail to recognize that the coffee roasting process is complex and that a successful roast should ideally monitor and control bean temperature and type to create a time/temperature profile to optimize roast performance for each bean type. The ideal roaster must have the capability of controlling all phases of the roasting process from an initial heat cycle through completion of cooling. The present device can account for a number of variables including the bean type, quantity of beans being roasted in a given cycle, initial bean temperature and the bean water content.
The present invention recognizes that an experienced coffee drinker can readily detect the difference between a coffee roasted at, for example, 435.degree. F. and one roasted at 445.degree. F. In other words, slight differences in the degree of roast are discernable. In addition to this, and by way of example, a coffee brought abruptly to a temperature of 445.degree. F. and then rapidly cooled, can be discerned as having a different set of taste characteristics than the same coffee beans being slowly brought up to the same temperature of 445.degree. F. and cooled identically. As such, varying heat profiles can also greatly affect the final result. Abrupt and rapid cooling down to room temperature at a precise point in the roast cycle is necessary to halt the roast process and lock in certain characteristics at that point. Even the speed with which the cooling process takes place can greatly affect the final result, since it is readily halting the chemical pyrolysis underway in the bean at a certain point.
It is thus an object of the present invention to provide a small volume roaster which is capable of being preprogrammed for multiple standard roasts allowing for variability in each roast to achieve infinite reliability yet optimized roast characteristics.
It is yet a further object of the present invention to provide for a small volume coffee bean roaster with the capability of controlling various factors including the degree of roast and rate of roast, taking into account only the bean type and virtually eliminating other variable effects.
It is yet a further object of the present invention to provide a small batch roaster intended for home use which provides for manual operation to enable a roaster with sufficient knowledge and judgment to control the roasting process while bypassing the microprocessor control parameters otherwise available.
It is yet a further object of the present invention to provide a small batch roaster for home use which is customizable allowing a user to program various options in order to personalize roasting characteristics.
These and further characteristics of the present invention will become more readily apparent when considering the following disclosure and appended claims.